Finding the grace of God at work in social media

It's easy to make fun of Facebook. It gobbles up time and takes us away from our work. It encourages us to post inane photos (I'm not immune to this temptation) – for example, what's on our plate at Applebee's ("Mmm, baby back ribs!"). It invites people to boast of their accomplishments or popularity. ("Can't believe 10 people showed up for my book-launch party!") It fosters navel-gazing, solipsism and even hypochondria. ("Sore throat again.")

Worst of all, it takes us away from one-on-one contact with live human beings, and substitutes virtual relationships for lasting ones. That's the most damning critique of Facebook. Rather than post a "Happy Birthday" message on a person's wall (which I do almost every day -- though not for the same person), it's probably better to call them up. Five minutes of real time is better than an hour of Facebook time. The other night a friend noticed that I had just posted a comment on his page, and he called me.

But like many other social media sites, and more broadly the Web itself, Facebook can also be a conduit of grace. Surprised? Of course not. You know that God can work through any medium, even ones that are supposedly tearing us apart. The easiest way to illustrate this is with a story.

A few months ago I noticed a Facebook page for "alumni" of the Ridge Park Elementary School, in Conshohocken, Pa., of which I myself am a proud alumnus. And the other day one of my childhood friends posted a handful of color photos that I had not only never before seen –but that showed something that I had entirely forgotten.

Snapped on a field behind our school, clearly during recess, the photos show my friends and me in the process of building a human pyramid. The first snapshot depicts us readying the pyramid; the second the triumphant success; the third, our tumbling over one another as the pyramid collapsed. The photos were taken on what must have been a cool day in early fall or late spring, since some of us are wearing lightweight jackets, others are in short sleeves. I would guess that it was the fifth grade.

I can't describe how moving it was to see these photos. It was as if God were giving my soul a window into a day that I had long forgotten. I felt like a time traveler as I stared at those images, taking in all the details. With a start, I even remembered the pants I was wearing: blue-and-green striped bell-bottoms – way cool in 1968!